Bring on the College Football Season!

As the days begin to get shorter and the occasional evening has that touch of coolness (ok, a lot of them here in the Northwest), we know that football season is upon us.

The college season has already started with a handful of lower division games last weekend and several FBS games last night and a pretty good slate of games this weekend.  Thus, it is time to get my ratings going again.

Because my ratings are based solely on the results on the field, the current ones are simply the end of season ratings from last year.  That means Alabama starts the year #1 which is ironically who many polls have #1 to start the year.

Using last years ratings for this years teams is not the best, I usually expect my ratings to become fairly accurate after 3 games or so, but I have still run regular season projections and have posted predictions for this weekend's games.

The projections have a bevy of teams finishing 11-1 including Alabama, LSU, Boise State, Oregon, Wisconsin, Houston, and Oklahoma State.  Now, being based on last years ratings, some of those teams may not be as strong as last year and not get there, we'll know more after a few weeks.

Who might finish undefeated?  While no teams is projected to do so yet, the team with the best chance of doing so is Alabama (35%) followed closely by LSU (34%).  A lot will hinge on their game at LSU on November 3.  Boise State also has a good shot (34%) as does Oregon (31%).  Less likely are Wisconsin (22%), Houston (20%), and Oklahoma State (15%).

Look for the first ratings of the season to include this years games early next week.

A new poll: The AP is ranking the NFL

The Associated Press has decided to cash in on the popularity of polls in the college game and other sports and introduced a poll for the NFL.  In their first poll, Green Bay leads the way at #1 followed by New England and the New York Giants.

As a reminder, my end of last year ratings also had Green Bay #1 despite not getting to the Superbowl with New England at #2.  I had New Orleans #3 but obviously with the off-season changes that may not be accurate.

I do not release any sort of pre-season ratings as I keep my ratings purely objective and so don't do any manual adjustments based on the draft, trades, or free-agent signings.  I've found that my ratings adapt to a teams real capabilities within a few weeks of the regular season.

Even so, I did post projected records using last years end of season ratings which has Green Bay and New England both at 12-4.